The first weekend of June was a big one for several NFL teams, and that's because they picked up some serious salary cap space.
Thanks to the NFL's post-June 1 designation rule, there were EIGHT teams that picked up at least $9 million in cap space over the weekend, which is like finding money in your couch cushion two months after you left it there.
June 1 is one of those dates that gets thrown around a lot in conversation during the NFL offseason, but not everyone knows what it means, so let's break it down.
During the offseason, each NFL team is allowed to cut up to two players with a post-June 1 designation. When this designation gets used, a team will cut a player, but the team won't gain any cap space at the time of the cut. Instead, they'll gain the extra salary cap space after June 1.
If you're wondering why a team would go this route, it's because the player's salary cap hit can be spread out over two years if he's released with a post-June 1 designation. If they don't use the designation and a player gets cut before June 1, then the team has to eat his entire salary cap hit that year.
There were a total of eight teams that picked up at least $9 million in salary cap space, thanks to their post-June 1 cuts. We've listed each team below along with how much cap space they gained and who they got rid of to gain it (All numbers via Over the Cap).
- Raiders: $24 million (Jimmy Garoppolo)
- Dolphins: $18.5 million (Xavien Howard)
- 49ers: $18 million (Arik Armstead)
- Cardinals: $16 million (DJ Humphries)
- Packers: $10.6 million (De'Vondre Campbell)
- Lions: $10.5 million (Cam Sutton)
- Bills: $10.2 million (Tre'Davious White)
- Cowboys: $9.5 million (Michael Gallup)
Of the eight teams listed above, five of them -- the Raiders, 49ers, Cardinals, Packers and Lions -- now rank in the top 10 for most available cap space, thanks to the room they gained on June 1. With each of these eight teams gaining a substantial amount of cap space, it won't be surprising if we see a few free agency signings go down over the next week or two.
The extra cap space could really come in handy for the Cowboys, who had less than $3 million in salary cap space before gaining the extra cap room on Saturday. The Cowboys are currently trying to get long-term deals done with several players, including Dak Prescott, CeeDee Lamb and Micah Parsons, so this small chunk of additional cap space might help them get a deal done faster with at least one of those players. Getting a deal done with Lamb as soon as possible would probably make the most sense and we explain why here.
Speaking of the June 1 deadline, we went through and took a look at some possible cut and trade candidates from around the league, and you can check those out here.
